I took Luke 5: 12 – 14 as today’s passage. I was struck immediately by the appropriate parallel of sin and leprosy. My Father showed me that sin is a sort of leprosy of the soul, eating away at it, dimming its glory, spreading throughout it. My Father made our souls to be as bright as angels, and He longs to heal them of this disease.

While I was meditating on this, I dozed off a moment, and had a very brief, but vivid, dream – a nightmare. It was very dark, but a deathly white, leprous hand reached out toward me, its finger pointing accusingly at me. I heard the intake of a breath, as if someone were about to speak, and knew the coming word would be the creature’s claim on me. It was pronounced in a hissing whisper: “Strawberries.” Strawberries?! The absurdity of it bolted me wide awake. I almost laughed, then I realized it was symbolic. I searched frantically through my memory, then found what was fined under “strawberries.” It was only a single entry – strawberry leaves were used emblematically on ducal coronets. The coronet, in turn, symbolizes power, authority – and pride!

It’s rather frightening to have one’s weakness brought to light in such a manner. I began begging my Father to heal me of my pride, to pull me from the creature’s claim on me. He wasn’t there. No one was! I was left alone with a single glimmer of hope; I grabbed it. I went to my bookcase and began looking up strawberries in the various dictionaries of symbolism that I have. The only entry I found was enough. It began, not with the prideful, ducal leaves, but with an explanation that the berries were once sacred to Frigga, the Norse goddess, but, with the coming of Christianity, were transferred to Mary. What a perfect paradox! The berries (Mary, our Father’s most humble creature) are the bane of the leaves (pride). Through Mary’s powerful intercession, I can be cured of, and shielded from, this leprosy of the soul. (1)

(1) Spiritual director: Good – was a gifted day.